His Type
by Doodle Dee Bop Bop
Summary: Reade had a type. The girls he had liked had all fit a cookie cutter mold. All of them, except for Zapata. Zapata never felt like she deserved anyone, especially not Reade.
1. Chapter 1

**This is gonna be so short, but that moment between Reade and Zapata killed me. Had to write about it lol.**

 _His Type_

Through all his life Edgar Reade had always had a type of girl he liked.

In elementary school, he had his first ever crush on Shelly Silverstein who sat in front of him in his first grade class. She used to tap her pencils against the back of her chair when she was bored, and always called him Eddy. Of course, everyone called him Eddie, so it wasn't that special of a thing. It sounded special though when she said it. Every little thing she asked for, like if he could, 'Pretty please pick up her Barbie pencil pouch' was followed by an adorable little way of saying Eddie. Six years old and he was already in love. He used to push her on the swing at recess, every day, and at the end of recess she would thank him with a hug and it was all worth it.

He moved on from Shelly, and instead found himself in the seventh grade with his very first girlfriend. Bryanna Hicks. What a girl. 4 foot 5 and feisty as a puma. Reade had been invited to sit at the super cool eighth graders table, since he played football and was 'all that' and there she was. Her dark curly hair and bright smile had won him over from the first second. On Tuesday, she said she's kiss him is he gave her his tater tots. His first kiss was something to remember. Under the bleachers and everything. This went on for a few weeks, with Bryana asking for more of his lunch, or his homework answers, or even straight up cash. To be able to hold her hand for a piece of pizza. Make out with her for two whole minutes of he gave her the answer to the history homework. Then, on November 12, she said for twenty bucks she'd be his girlfriend. It was the best cash he ever spent.

They broke up three weeks later, and Edgar found himself very lonely for the next few years. His junior year of high school, Alexis Tiller, who was a cheerleader, said they just had to go to prom together, because he was a foootball player. So she told him in about three minutes what color corsage she needed to match her dress, which was purple, where to get the tie to match, and to give her 50 bucks so she could pay for their part of the limo some of the cheerleaders were renting. It was a fun night, full of Alex telling him when they would dance, drink punch that may or may not have been spiked with a little something, and when to sit with her purse and shoes so she could go to the bathroom with all her cheer friends. At the ended of the night, he felt her up in the dark and deep hallways of the hotel prom was held in, but he wasn't allowed to go any further because she was a good Christian girl who said she wasn't going to lose her virginity until she was married. She also did not attend graduation because she was busy delivering her first child.

By college, Edgar had realized he fell for the girls who bossed him around. The controlling bitches who told him what to do, what to say, and had very strict instructions on what kind of condoms to buy. That was why he never thought he would fall for Zapata. She was different. She was funny and sarcastic and rude, but she wasn't like the other girls he had liked. She let him be him, he could make mistakes, and she would back him up. He could make decisicions for once in his life, and not be judged. He could be human, and not a robot controllled by a pretty girl.

He had found a new type of girl.


	2. Chapter 2

"Zapata, you're drunk."

"Am I drunk, or are you just too damn sober."

Zapata slurred, putting down her glass.

Usually, Reade would be up for some drinking with the team, but ever since the accident, he had been on a shit ton of medication. It didn't take a rocket science to know not to mix the two, so he was stuck being sober. He wouldn't have minded, except for the fact that it wasn't a team thing. Patterson was in the hospital, Weller had snuck out of Reade's apartment barely thirty minutes after getting there, and Jane was a no-show like always. Instead, it was him on the couch, and Zapata drinking away the embarrassment she got from the kiss.

It was a pretty damn good kiss, short as it was, in Reade's mind. Zapata's lips that were usually sharp and witty were smooth and soft against his. Her hair was so close to him, and smelled like smoke and iron, but also something nice like apples.

"I can guarantee you are drunk right now." He said, a laugh following his words.

"I'm gonna call a cab, it's late already." She said.

Her breath hitched as she looked through her coat's pockets. "Shit, where is my freakin' wallet." She mumbled.

He could have paid for the cab, he could have booked her an uber, he could have helped her look for the wallet, but he did none of those things. "You could stay here." He suggested.

"Nah, it's fine Reade, I can walk. I'm a big girl." She teased, putting on her coat.

"Tash, I have to sleep on the couch anyways for my leg, it wouldn't be a problem for you to sleep in my room."

"You don't have to, it's not a far walk."

"Tasha, it's below freezing out and you live twelve blocks away. I'm not going to make you walk in that. Besides, I don't think your sober enough for that." He reasoned.

She pondered her options briefly, before realizing he was right. "Okay. Thanks Eddie." And suddenly his heart was melting all over again.

"Take a shower." He laughed, "Maybe it will help you sober up."

"We can only hope." She laughed, even though neither of them had really said anything funny.

As she left the room, Edgar Reade realized he was completely and utterly screwed.

* * *

Tasha looked around Reade's bathroom. It was minimalist in the way only a single man's bathroom could be. There were few products on the couple of shelves in the shower, and barely any on the counter space. Reade was a nice guy, but he was too nice for her. He deserved a good girl, someone who had her shit together, and could put up with his. Zapata was a mess though, and she knew she didn't deserve a good guy.

The whole mess with her Dad happened when she was pretty young, so it wasn't like she had someone to look up to as a role model for her future husband. Instead she knew seedy apartment owners who would offer her mother cheaper rent if she came into their offices and showed them what exactly she had to offer. She knew drug addicts, and bad boys who got bad girls pregnant and never graduated because they were too cool for school. Boys who lived in shadows of cigarette smoke and cooed he into doing the things that seedy bad boys who grew into seedy men did to her mother. She deserved guys like Josh.

Josh lived in the apartment next to hers when she was 14, and he was 18. He had a car all of his own, and hair that had fancy gel in it that made it all hard and spiky. He didn't really know who she was, and would call things like Sasha or Alicia, because he was too cool to know the name of some random freshman girl who liked to sit in the bathroom where the older girls smoked and put on makeup during lunch.

One day, he asked if she wanted a ride to school. And she sat in shotgun, with her hair all nice, and she had put on a bit of makeup she stole from her mother even though she wasn't supposed to do that, and her mom told her to buy her own shit, but she already had to buy food for her and her brother so it wasn't like she had money for that crap. But that day she looked nice. Josh said he'd drive her everyday, but someday she might have to pay him back.

She was so stupid, and said she didn't have money for that. And he laughed, and said that she didn't have to pay him back like that. And she was stupid, and she laughed along like she knew what he was talking about.

The next day he drove her, and he put his hand on her knee while he drove and she didn't know why but she kind of liked it but not really. The next few days he would bring it higher, and higher until his hand was rubbing against her thigh, and she didn't like that.

Zapata wanted to kill 14 year old her. She was so damn stupid. One day in January he asked if she wanted to come over after school. She agreed and he brought her to his apartment, and made her sit on the couch, and she listened to strange music, and she drank strange drinks, and he had a strange way of laughing.

She woke up and it was dark. She had pain she had never felt before between her legs, and there was blood in her underwear. She ran out of his apartment, and never talked to him again. She walked to school, and gave glares to the catcalls and the sick men who dared to look at her ass while she walked through the freezing March rain. She kissed boys in the lorckerrooms, bathrooms, any rooms. She lived for the thrill of not knowing if someone would find her in a closest making out with anyone from students, to the occasional teacher. She was hooked on thrill of gambling her reputation away.

She put walls up, and played by her own rules. She wouldn't let another Josh ruin her.

She didn't deserve a guy like Reade, who was nice, and funny, and actually cared. She deserved someone who was as used up and worthless as she was.


	3. Chapter 3

Reade had made it more than clear that she could use anything she wanted. She was more than welcome to his overpriced body wash, to sleep in his perfectly made bed, and could borrow anything she needed for pajamas.

That was the problem. Reade was more than welcome to open his entire home, his entire world, up to her. Zapata, on the other hand, was so closed off and guarded. She couldn't give him anything like he could for her. She couldn't give anyone that. Her life was hers alone, her pain and suffering had to remain hers. All the mistakes she made had to remain her own; her debts, her losses, and her messes.

The shower was hot, with the water borderline burning, but Zapata's mind was in places other than the temperature. She tried to keep the shower as short as possible, mostly just using the water to try and cleanse her soul and mind. Nothing could ever clean her though, she was garbage. Soiled by the life she never chose for herself.

When she was little, she liked to play house with the girls who lived in the apartment three doors down from her. They would plan their futures together, counting off how many dogs they would have, and what color pony they would buy. Tasha never knew what kind man she wanted to marry. Her friends would say they wanted to marry boys like their daddy, but Tasha never wanted that

She had wanted a nice guy who would play soccer with her, and they would eat ice cream together, and he would think she was beautiful. Callie, the older girl, laughed at her and said she was stupid. Tasha moved away three weeks later and never told anyone her dreams ever again.

She learned that those dreams would never come true, and she knew for damn sure she couldn't ruin Reade to get what she wanted.

* * *

Reade knew he was bad. It was bad to think about your friends in the shower. It was bad to think about kissing your friends. It was bad to think about walking into the bathroom your friend was showering in and tell her you want to kiss her again and again.

He wish he could talk to Weller about it. It wasn't like being attracted to a team member was new information for him, the sexual tension between Kurt and Jane was so high it was statistically unlikely that they hadn't at least tried to fuck. He couldn't tell anyone though, he couldn't let anyone know about him and Zapata.

Who was he kidding? Zapata didn't like him that way. She was confident and smart mouthed while he was silent and stoic. She was a firecracker who shouldn't be tied down to someone like himself. Reade had dreams of raising a family, and sleeping in on Saturdays when he would wake up next to the woman he loved.

Zapata probably didn't even want to settle down. He could see her spending her whole life wild and free, just like her gorgeous hair. Her gorgeous everything. He didn't know how he could go back to work and be able to look at her without all these feelings bubbling up, and that wasn't good for everyone. Damn, he was screwed.

* * *

Stepping out of the bathroom, with just a towel around her, she felt vulnerable. She was naked in a man's apartment. Sure, she was an adult, and yes this had happened multiple times before mostly in a sexual setting, she had never felt so safe. Reade would never hurt her, she had seen him at his worst in the basement of _that_ house on _that_ night, and she had seen him at his best when he was doing the work he loved.

She could imagine herself a life here. She traced her hand over the drawers of his dressers, opening a few. She had always been nosy. She found his tee-shirts, and picked one up. In a perfect world she would wear her boyfriends tee-shirt to bed. They would sleep in the same bed. She would finally feel safe.

She couldn't let herself do this. She couldn't make up a life with Reade, she wasn't ready and she knew damn well he wasn't ready to handle her shit.

She was never good at letting go. She stuffed the tee-shirt into her coat pocket; the soft, black fabric felt nice against her hand and she knew that it smelled like him too. All soapy and clean smelling, but also mixed with the scent of the aftershave she had just seen on his bathroom counter. Her coat felt like it weighed a thousand pounds with her little secret inside of it.

It was like shoplifting, but worse. Stealing from some stupid drugstore because she couldn't afford tampons was a low, but stealing from a friend, and coworker, was even lower.

"I'm leaving. I just can't do this." She muttered as she walked out of the apartment, not even waiting an extra second to hear what Reade had to say.

Even if she had waited a second more, it wouldn't have mattered, Reade was speechless. One minute his best friend was chilling in his apartment, and he felt like he hadn't ruined their relationship and fucked it to hell. Now he was all alone, and he had no one.

"Damn Zapata." He muttered to himself. He would be lying if he hadn't checked out her ass as she walked out the door.

* * *

 **Lol, so this is happening. I don't really know exactly where this is going. What do you guys think of** **reade/zapata?**


	4. Chapter 4

**OMFG, that scene in the episode where Reade was like "you're not my type" honestly made me die inside, haha.**

Reade arrived at the office early that morning. His leg had healed up fine enough that he was cleared for desk work, and he had realized how much he missed his job. He was settled into his desk nicely, until he noticed the vacant desk across from his. Where was Zapata?

She was the kind of woman who always got to work early, even though she most definitely isn't a morning person. Reade learned that the hard way when he had planned a brunch on a Saturday before noon, and got footed with the bill from the coffee incident. The team stuck to drinking from then on.

"Hey, Gary." Reade motioned the aging agent who had the unfortunate luck of being stuck next to him and Zapata. "Have you'd seen Tasha today?"

Gary sniffled sharply, as if he was disturbed by Reade making conversation with him. It was barely 7:30 and the dude already had a stick up his ass. "No, Edgar. I have not seen her. Isn't she on your team? Shouldn't you keep track of her?"

"Sorry man, just asking." He muttered as he got up from his desk. Stupid Gary.

He walked past Weller's office, and decided to head in. Kurt looked small surrounded by hundreds of file folders and sheets of paper.

"Hey Weller." He said, a look of relief poured over Kurt's face.

"Thank God." Weller sighed. "I need something to do beside read case files on terrorist attacks. Sit down." He motioned to the chair in front of his desk. "Sorry I couldn't stay for drinks with you and Tasha."

"No problem, it was perfectly okay just the two of us." He chuckled, wishing that he could have spent more time with her.

"That's good." Kurt sighed.

Maybe he should tell him, Reade thought. Tell him all the thing she thought about Zapata. Ask him for advice on how to get the girl or something. Let someone know he was in love. "Kurt, can I-"

"Shit, I got to take this call." Weller muttered. "Can we talk later?"

"Yeah." He replied, walking out of the office.

Time to find Zapata.

He made his way to the locker room, making sure to check all of the other possible places she might be beforehand; the training room, hallway where the vending machines are, and the break room with half decent coffee.

"Where you been, Zapata?" He asked, leaning against the lockers as he watched her grab her gun.

"It's like seven in the morning, Reade. Where do you think I was?" She smirked, hands running through her hair.

Her gorgeous hair. It was the greatest hair he had ever seen on a woman, shiny as hell and just gorgeous.

"Where'd you go last night?" He inquired, taking a step closer to her, his breath hitching.

"Home. Are you extra dense today or something? What's with the stupid questions?" She looked genuinely puzzled, why did he even care where she had been? She wasn't interesting or anything like that. She had gone home and slept, and might have dreamt about Reade, but she would take that to her grave.

"Maybe I hurt more than my leg in that accident." He laughed, getting a chuckle out of Zapata.

"That's not shocking. You have been pretty off." She agreed, and he couldn't help but let his mind go to the kiss.

"Maybe I just realized what I wanted." He muttered. She looked at him with a confused smirk, as if she had no idea what he was talking about. "Forget it. See you later."

"Was there something you wanted to talk about?She asked before he could leave. "You couldn't have come all this way just to say hi to me Ed."

"Maybe I did. Maybe I like seeing your face in the mornings." Maybe I would like to wake up next to that face, he thought.

"Yeah right."

"Yeah, I do Zapata. I like saying hi to you in the mornings. I like talking to you. I like working with you. I like getting drunk with you. I like you." He said, his emotions coming out all at once.

"I like you too Reade, you're a good friend." Zapata smiled, before walking out of the lockerroom.

Left behind was a broken-hearted Edgar Reade. "I think I just got friend zoned." He muttered, before bringing his fist against the wall of the locker room.


	5. Chapter 5

Reade spent the next two weeks faking his way through the workdays, and drinking his nights away. At first he had gone to bars to drink away all the wrong feelings he had, because he really, really, really should not fantasize about kissing Zapata overtime he saw. After a few days, he made a big fucking mistake. A blonde mistake with double D's and a taste for something more than Edar's mouth led him astray from what he wanted. The whole night he simply thought of how he would refer to be running his hands down Zapata's thighs. How he would love to see her taking off her underwear, and helping her do it. He jut wanted to be with her.

He wanted to be stupid and crazy and in love with her and everything she did. Instead, he was spending nights in bed with one night stands and going to work with hangovers.

It was another one of those days, when he noticed Zapata looking particularly pissed off in the hallway.

"Tash?" He asked her, before being to stick his words so far up his ass they came out his throat. She was a feisty one.

He walked down to Patterson's lab, they were fairly close and she might have some idea about why Zapata was in a particularly bad mood.

"Reade!" The perky blonde exclaimed. It was a fairly uneventful week, with there being no breaks in the tattoos, and Kurt being out of town for the next few days to be briefed on some new policy. Patterson seemed excited to see someone who wasn't one of her lab assistants. "What can I do for you?"

"Have you talked to Zapata today?" He asked, noticing the way Patterson's face immediately changed as soon as he asked his question. Her expression changed from her usual perky smile, to a slightly less happy solemn expression. She looked like she was at a loss for words, as she bit her lip.

"I tried to." She muttered, shuffling some of the papers around on her desk.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" He asked, the two of them walking further into the lab. Reade had never realized how large this building actually was.

"Nothing. She just came in today, asked if I could track down a guy for her, and when I asked why she panicked and left. I think she's just having a hard time." Patterson said, growing uncomfortable with talking about her coworker without her present

"Hard time with what?" He pressed, his concern growing for Zapata every second.

"I thought she told you? If she didn't I can't tell you, it has to come from her." Patterson replied, placing her stack of papers in a manilla folder.

"What? Patterson you can tell me." He pressed, growing agitated.

"No I can't. Look Reade, I'm not going around telling people about our conversations, so why would I do that to Zapata?"

"Maybe because I'm worried about her, Patterson."

"You're worried about _her?_ Reade, you should worry about yourself. We've noticed your drinking, whether you realized we did or not. You're really letting yourself go." Patterson said. "Besides, all that alcohol is gonna make you fat soon." She smirked, walking him gently in the stomach with her folder.

"Oh no, I'm not getting fat. I've got abs of steel, you want to feel them Patterson? They're rocks. Actual rocks." He joked, getting a laugh out of the blonde.

"I think you need to rematch that video on workplace on sexual harassment." She laughed.

"Well on that note, I'm gonna go find someone who finds my abs endearing." He smirked, and it was _totally_ a coincidence he was looking for Zapata.

* * *

Zapata reread the message on her phone for the fiftieth time, tears threatening to come to her eyes.

"Tasha?" Edgar asked, shit. He couldn't see her cry. Stay Strong, Zapata, she thought. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be, Ed?" She replied as nonchalant as she possibly could.

"Maybe because you've been staring at your phone for the past twenty minutes." He sat down along the wall with her, their knees just barely touching. She would be lying if she didn't feel a little bit of a spark. "Come on, Z, what's up?"

She handed him the phone, his eyes moving as he read the text message. The same one she had been pondering since she received it this morning.

The message, while not threatening, scared her to shit.

"Hey Nat, let's finish what we started- Josh" Reade read out. "Who's Josh?" He asked.

"A very big mistake." She replied, pulling her knees to her chest. "When I was 14..." She got silent.

"Zapata. It's okay, you can tell me anything." He smiled at her.

"He raped me when I was 14, Reade." She said.

He was gonna kill that son of a bitch.


	6. Chapter 6

**Wow! It's been a year! I'm a piece of shit! I could lie and say I forgot my account info or something but truthfully I just felt uninspired to continue. But here's the thing, multiple people (or one very very persistent person) have been commenting since I last updated A YEAR AGO so I guess if y'all are interested I'll write. I'm doing a time jump partially because I don't know where I thought I was going, but hopefully this makes sense? Like I don't know what I'm doing**

 **So basically this is completely non Canon anymore cuz I don't feel like trying to work this into the whole current plot with new ratios. No. Just no.**

 **So I guess for reference this takes place about a month after chapter 5? I have no idea, roll with whartever makes sense.**

Sometimes it was easy to forget that she could get scared. The way she could take down a man twice her size, and down a drink like nobody's business it was just so easy to think of her as invincible.

Then someday he saw her crying in a hallway, or frozen in fear and all he wanted to do was wrap his arms around her small torso and make everything in the world right for her.

As much as he wanted the texts to stop. They never did. He couldn't convince her to talk to anybody about getting it stop. She refused to change her number and every time she blocked the creeps number he just got a new phone.

Sometimes he emailed her. Strange poems about her hair and and her thighs.

The last straw was when he sent her a photo of her apartment window, with the caption 'waiting for you'

Reade decided enough was enough and convinced Weller to send a team to her apartment. They didn't find anything.

"You know I'm not letting you go home alone, right?" Reade asked her.

"I dont need a detail, Reade." She mumbled, dryind her tearstained eyes with the sleeve of her shirt.

Reade wished he could wipe away those tears. He wished he could make the crying stop with a kiss. He wished he could help her.

"Not a detail. I'm coming home with you tonight."

"Little forward there, aren't we?" She laughed, he liked seeing her smile.

"As a friend Zapata, dammit." He wished it wasn't as a friend.

He wished he came home with her every night. He wished he made her pancakes on Saturday mornings and cooked dinner with her on Friday nights.

"I just want to know your safe Z."

"I'd like that Reade. I'd like that a lot."

 **Short after, but leave a comment if your actually interested in me continuing. If you are I'll try to add another chapter before 2019**


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